I use a simple Excel spreadsheet to put together my LPE/tour budget. I have created and amended the sheet over the years and am now pretty happy with it. As well as helping make basic calculations the sheet also acts as a memory aid as it contains categories for most of the expenses a large rock tour is liable to incur. By working my way down the spreadsheet I cannot only get a picture of costs but I also know I am not forgetting anything!
The screen shots show an overview of the budget/LPE I am working on. You may download your own copy of the sheet here . Please feel free to adapt and amend the sheet as necessary.
Using the sheet is a simple matter of researching the particular costs (from experience or from quotes you may have asked for) and then entering the figures in the appropriate columns.
The final ‘multiplier’ column must have a value of at least one for the sheet to calculate properly. For instance if you look at Per Diems in the screen grab you will see that drivers PDs are $88 x 29 days with a multiplier of 1 as there is just one guy getting the per diems for 29 days. However when you look ‘crew days off’ (I always try to a higher rate for days off as there is no catering supplied on those days) you can see that the calculation is $25 x 6 (the numbers of days off) x 3 (number of crew).
Now I can work my way down the sheet, entering numbers and dealing with the organizational activities associated with each of the various categories as I go along.
Related posts:
- A Tour Manager diary part 1 I am aware that my ‘Tour Manager Challenge’ posts...
- A Tour Manager diary part 5 One of the onerous tasks associated with concert tour...
- A Tour Manager diary part 3 4th June 2008 I have decided to go back...
- Tour Manager diary part 2 May 09th 2008 I have decided that a sleeper...
- Tour Manager Challenge pt2 I have been grappling with the list of predicted...
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Andy,
I’ve just stumbled across your site by beautiful accident. I’m currently studying a degree in Music & New Media Management and we’re doing a Tour management assignment including all parts of the deal. I’ve set up a spreadsheet myself and then saw the link to yours, but unfortunately it seems it’s not online on your server anymore.
Would be very happy if you could send me the spreadsheet or re upload it
Great site, keep it up!
Cheers
Alex
Alex,
Please email me at andy.reynolds@tourconcepts.com to remind me and I’ll ping it over to you. I will be adding all those tools on Live Music Business soon.
I stumbled upon you too, while looking for a tour manager. Love the 2 series, but the spreadsheet here is not visible on my pc. Where else can I get it?
The spreadsheet is at: http://livemusicbusiness.com/artist-resources/tools/